Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1887-01-06

transpianted stalk BY stalk. Every
spear of rice grown in the lowlands IS
transp!anted by hand. When we COM
slider that the lowland product
amounts annually to more than $780,
100000 bushels we can appreciate the
amount OF patient labor involved.
Foreigners laugh at this process of rice
culture, thinking that the Japanese do
not know that rice can be grown with
out transplanting. These foreigners,
among whom are many Americans,
sometimes tell the Japanese farmers
that in America and other countries
rice is raised without transplanting.
The farmers listen patiently, and to all
appearance thankfully, but they do not
see tit to sacrifice the winter crop of
wheat, barley. rye and vegetables.
Rice is the great crop of the coun-
try. Fully one-half of all the land
under tillage is devoted to that food.
plant There are two general varieties
of rice grown-lowland and upland.
Lowland rice is grown in the valleys
and on the plains where irrigation is
practicable and where the plant can
be flooded. In order that this can be
done the land is subdivided into small
plats, and levied or embarked. In
valleys that have any slope in order
that the plat may be level the en-
banked subdivisions must be small, not
larger in many instances than a good
sized room; in Others as large as an
average-sized house, AID the valley
must have a very gentle slope to allow
the plats to contain more than a half
acre. The embankments are made of
mud, and are about two and one-half
feet high. Their construction and the
leveling of the plats involve consider
able labor, but the results richly repay
it
Besides rice. barley, wheat. rye, mel
let and some corn are grown. BY far
the most important of these cereals is
rice, yet nothing can be further from
the truth than that rice is the exclusive
food OF the people. Rice when hulled
is pure starch, and that nutritive ele-
ment will not support animal life.
Wheat Is raised as winter crop to the
amount of 40, 600, 900 bushels annually.
Wheat is generally hulled, boiled and
eaten the same as rice. Sometimes it
is ground; and when mixed with other
substances made into cakes, but it is
never made into bread, as with us. In
fact, there is no word in the Japanese
language for bread. There is no pro-
cess known to Japanese cooking an
alogous to yeast fermentation. There
is not a flour mill in the whole en-
pire. Grains are ground by small
hand-mills, the exact counterpart of
those seen delineated on the tombs and
temples of the Egyptians, then bolted
in small boxes by shaking the -four
through several sieves or screens COW
cred with cotton cloth. Barley and
rye are grown and used in the same
way as wheat The barley produced
is 6O,OOO,OOO bushels annually. Millet
is an important food factor. It grows
in latitudcs and at attitudes that pre-
vent rice-growing. 1t yields abund-
antly and is i nourishing food. 1t
yields from fifty to sixty bushels to the
acre. and is eaten after boiling, or it is
ground into flour.
Every variety of vegetable is grown,
and these people have domesticated
many kinds of plants that are still
at least one hundred food-plants. use
full in domestic economy, which we
could borrow from them to advantage.
These islanders have successfully done
what We have attempted and failed to
do. They produce all or nearly all the
sugar they use. In Japan, since long
before written records, the sorghum
cane has been grown, and granulatcd
sugar has been made from it. In 1881
5l2. 100000 pounds were produced.
Any ragged cody with a rusty pot can
take the juice of the sorghum cane and
make fine granulatcd ''C'' sugar.
Agricultural labor is low-priced. In
the interior of the country. beyond the
influences of foreign trade.
any number of men and women can
be hired to work in the fields for from
12} to Is cents day, and the laborer
boards himself. Young. strong wom-
en- work by the month for from 80 to
S3. and find themselves. Men get a
little more. By the year men and
women work for from $15 to $50, and
are boarded. 1t seems incredible that
life can be sustained from such earn |
ings, but it must be borne in mind that
the purchasing power of money is in
comparably greater there than here.
or in Europe, even. Rice is worth II
cents = pound, wheat 50 to Is cents |
per hundred. and barley is still cheap |
er. Turnips, radishes, beets. beans.
peas. sweet and Irish potatoes are ver5
cheap.
As the laborer eats no meat HI,
food, being composed entirely of veg
etables, costs much less than ours. Il
pound of shoyu beans, containing 40
per cent of heterogeneous matter and
20 per cent of oily matter, fully as
rich IS q pound of beef composed of |
the same nutritive elements, can be
bought for II cents. The extreme SIM
plicity of their civilization in houses.
clothing and food
makes living cheap and easy. This
is taught in their religion
and philosophy. and is enforced by
the example and authority of the OFF,
cials of the government In short. if
their civilization gives the laborer lit |
tie in wages, it demands little in the |